” According to Hoyle”
The term “brand” seems to derive from the archaic Scottish language for a torch.  It recurs in Shakespearean language when characters refer to something as “burn new,” meaning fresh from the forge.  “Branding,” or pressing flame-heated shapes into the skin of livestock as a means to declare ownership became a household term during the American western period, and it is from there that we retroactively apply the term to any mark placed on a product or service to denote its creator or quality.

In archeology, we find wine jugs as far back as the ruins of Pompeii with specific logos and marks pressed into the clay as a means to denote the vineyard (and the quality) of the wine within.  It seems that from the very advent of commerce, humans have been using visual symbolism to denote superior goods and services.

“Drive the Nail”

So what can a design team do for your brand?  Understanding this lies at the very heart of why design exists, and what designers actually do.

Good design considers both the medium and the audience when determining what colors, fonts, ratios, proportions, and gimmicks to employ in getting a specific message to a particular viewer.  Certain fonts have certain historical and emotional associations.  Certain colors create emotional responses and even affect human spending behavior.

A corporation like McDonald’s, for instance, utilizes a palette of warm reds and browns to excite the appetite while communicating value and quality.  WalMart uses blue and white to build their identity as an ever-present and reliable retailer.  Designers working for each of those corporations discussed the target market, the message, and the expected outcomes before they began creating visual materials to communicate these things.

“Someone you can Ride River with.”

It’s important to have this type of dialogue with your design and marketing professionals.  Like many products, a cheaply bought logo or mark is almost always inferior, and does nothing to communicate the spirit of your brand to your consumer audience.

A seasoned or educated design professional will discuss with you the details of your brand identity, your target market, and your competitor’s symbolism before passing any sketches to you.  Knowing what is being communicated is an absolute must if one is to create a lasting and powerful visual.

“Go through the Mill”

Once you define your brand, and locate a trained design professional, the process of creating your collateral (logos, brochures, business cards, and websites) requires that you trust in this expert.  There is a particular reason for each element of these designs, and it is best to ask what the rationale was before suggesting changes that might confuse your message.

Clients often ask me to use “fancier” fonts or brighter colors.  While these elements by themselves are quite appealing, as part of a greater design they can distract from the intended communication.  Is the suggested font “flashier” than the font in the client’s logo?  Does a new color detract from the message of stability and quality that most businesses are trying to convey?  These should be concerns in producing quality visual communication that will inspire your audience to choose your brand over the competition.

“Make yourself Top-Sawyer”

The most important thing any business can have is a clearly defined vision and plan for generating revenue.  Graphic design, in all of its forms, is merely the means by which you communicate this vision.  Quality graphics will only spread the passion of a particular idea from the business to the client and create a lasting relationship that will be mutually beneficial.

With television the programs are chosen by corporations, paid for with advertising dollars supplied by other corporations, and reinforced in schedule and content by ratings supplied by still further corporations. On the internet any person with a camera and a computer can suddenly become their own program. Podcasts and webcasts allow simple internet users to become newscasters and to comment on the world around them, free of the direction or control of corporation-run media.

Almost immediately when AOL launched the first major dial-up campaigns, there were concerns about video and audio piracy, information sharing, and digital distribution rights. The changes wrought by digital information sharing have affected every other media in existence, even on a legal level, leading to new laws about digital distribution rights and royalties.

Flash forward to what futurists are predicting in the world of our future, perhaps not even twenty years from now. Volkswagen recently launched a “2028″ website, showing their designers’ predictions for the cars (and the culture) of our world in a mere 20 years.

While the flying cars and oddly shaped cityscapes of science fiction are woefully absent, there is a strong emphasis on precisely what has changed our culture so much in the last decade: digital information sharing. In their simulations, vehicles in the next few years will become increasingly full of information displays showing maps, prices for commercial businesses, advertisements, and historical information. As a user drives, they will be able to view interior photos of buildings, learn what each business sells, and eventually discuss this information with other motorists.

Imagine, if you will, approaching a restaurant in a crowded commercial district, and reading the reviews of other motorists just now leaving the same establishment. You could know as you approach what the wait times are for the tables, which dishes might be sold out, what the soup of the day is, or whether the establishment is understaffed for the evening. This “secondary” layer of information is similar to our present culture of blogs and message boards, only more readily accessible in context. Rather than having to stop one activity to glean this level of user-generated content, drivers will be able to view the information in the context of their current setting, and to respond to it with their buying decisions as well as their own personal experiences.

So how does all of this relate to the internet as it is today? And how does it affect our design process, and our decisions about content and website architecture?

The web is, and has been, drifting closer and closer to this incredible level of interaction. Projects like the ShiftSpace Plugin allow users full control over their internet experience. They also allow other users to experience internet content as we ourselves interpret it, meaning that not only is the information itself open to comment and interpretation, but the vessel or vehicle of its presentation might also be modified.

Interactivity is, and has been the name of the game for the last few years. The establishment of blogs and forums allows clients and customers to feel they have a democratic say in your business. These utilities help brand various types of products, particularly those related to the service industry, and insure the growth of brand loyalty among a client base.

While there are technical risks to information sharing and user generated content, one can be assured that there are millions of programmers working daily to find solutions to malicious internet activity. The business of protecting internet commerce has grown so much, that many viruses and spam programs are now nothing more than annoyances, and are powerless to limit the fiscal rewards reaped from allowing interactive content.

As the internet evolves beyond the sterile commercial vehicle it was first thought to be in the mid 1990’s, we can be certain that the market reflects this evolution. When the digital focus turns to user-generated content and public information sharing, businesses with publicly accessible content will be offering their clients more value than similarly-priced brands without that democratic appeal.

Accessibility.

Barack Obama understood that you need to reach people where they are comfortable. He had a website, a blog, a Twitter page, a Facebook page, participated in online discussions, and had thousands of links on social bookmarking sites ( Digg, Reddit, etc.), all in addition to the voluminous amount of print, radio,tv advertisements, and interviews for his campaign. .

Obama’s internet marketing campaign relied heavily on his willingness to put himself outside of traditional political marketing mediums. Step outside of your comfort zones and market your business wherever you can. Post business updates on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook. Start a blog for your business and submit posts to Digg, Delicious, Reditt, and every other social networking site that you can find. Post on forums that relate to your industry—it is a great way to showcase your knowledge while helping people.

Internet marketing has become a very hot topic, because of the constant battle for market share,and since the concept of internet marketing is fairly new, many otherwise qualified professionals think that the only way to market their business online is to hire a professional. While there are always advantages to hiring a professional, there are many things that you yourself can do to increase your company’s online profile,so shake up your traditional business marketing. With a little knowledge and willingness to put your business out there, you can build a company image that will have customers cheering your name. Now that’s change you can believe in.

So, how can you add interest to your web site that will encourage people to revisit?

• Write a regular blog.
  Pose as an industry expert.  Write about everything under the sun that you know about your business, your experiences servicing customers, and tips that help your customers enjoy your products more.  You can even write quick blurbs about that special sale.  Schedule yourself to write on any reasonable schedule – maybe daily, weekly, monthly, or even quarterly.  The more content you write, the more exposure you will get on the World Wide Web.
• Create e-newsletters with links to certain web pages.
  An e-newsletter can be an effective marketing tool that brings “teaser” information to someone’s inbox and invites them back to your web site for more details.  Your newsletter can even be related to your blog articles, helping you streamline the writing process.
• Run a promotion or contest on your web site.
  Create an attractive web page for a special promotion with a small door prize.  Ask your guests to fill out a simple online form to participate.  Remember you can include the option to subscribe to your newsletter in the form, and you can follow up with an e-newsletter that announces the winner.

Your homepage should draw people into your site and make them want to see more. It should not only be easy to read but should load quickly as well. Although high speed internet is quickly becoming the standard, there is still a large percentage of people who connect through dial-up. If your homepage takes too long to load, then you could be losing large numbers of potential customers. In short, make your homepage easy to view for any internet connection.

Is your flash driving away visitors?

First consider who your core audience for this web site is – if it is mostly small communities with slow dial-up connections, Flash intro animations will not be ideal and will likely drive the visitors away.  If you are seeking a high end business to business web site, then a simple and classy Flash banner would be a nice compliment to some keyword rich introduction text on the homepage.  Be wary of Flash-only entry pages – these are solely for humans and will not be nice “food” for search engines.

Wait, what was your message?

Think of your homepage as a billboard for your site. You only have a few seconds to grab your customers attention so Make Your Message Clear. The design of your site should accentuate your message not obscure it. Remember content is King and site design should be the King’s loyal servant,–not the court jester.

Can You help me. I’m new here and I seem to be lost.

People have become comfortable navigating the internet because there are general similarities between websites. One of these similarities is the navigation bar. Placing this bar on the top, left, or right is acceptable and will be found by most people. Some sites, in an effort to be creative, turn their website navigation into a difficult to understand maze of clicks and animation. Your website does not exist to change the fundamental way people deal with the internet–it exists to draw in new customers. Do not make your website hard for them to navigate or you risk losing viewers.

Play it again Sam…but give me the choice to stop.

If you must use background music on your site make sure there is an easily accessible control to stop/mute the music. In fact, you may want to rethink having the music automatically play when people visit your site. Some people might be navigating from inside their quiet office and may not appreciate that your music plays on its own. No matter how much you like the song it is usually best to give your viewers the option.

Remember going door-to-door as a kid on Halloween? It was all about the treats. Every kid on the block set out to see which house would have the best candy that year – the house with the biggest bunch of chocolates and lolly pops. But there was always that one house that disappointed – nothing but boring snacks like apples and pretzels.

When it comes to web sites, you might have the greatest business in the world, but if your web site doesn’t look the part, you will instantly lose credibility. You only have one opportunity to make a good first impression. So, don’t be the disappointing house on the block – make sure your web site is a chocolate-covered delicacy!

Signs of Bad Website Design

* Poorly formatted, grainy, unprofessional graphics.
* Unnecessary scripting.
* Easily spammed web forms.
* Unorganized font schemes with too many sizes.
* Bad navigational structure.
* Code unfriendly to search engines.
* Displays incorrectly in different web browsers.
* Doesn’t highlight important contact information.
* Cannot easily expand on current website design.

Elements of Good Web Design

* Well placed, professional created graphics or stock photography.
* Easy-to-use navigational structure.
* Specifically chosen fonts and colors with a coherent design scheme.
* Important contact information is highlighted appropriately.
* Displays uniformly across all web browsers.
* Code allows easy indexing by Google and other search engines.
* Website design allow for easy expansion as your site grows.

Are you the house with the chocolate bars, or are you the house with the pretzels? With 12 years of experience under our belt, WEBii.net knows how to design or re-design your website so that your visitors will take it seriously. Remember, your visitors are like trick or treaters, and if they don’t find the good stuff on your website, then they are likely to flock to the other house down the street.

Remember, it’s October, and a scary looking costume is great, but a scary looking website…not so much, and WEBii.net can help. Contact us for a FREE quote today, or give us a call at 888-932-9377.

You may have noticed the increasing popularity of blogs on the Internet.  Blogs are not just for personal use and are not simply a soapbox; they are a great way to build content for your web site, attracting both visitors and search engines. Hosting your own blog can be free and easy.

Getting Started with WordPress Software?

WordPress is a powerful personal publishing platform, and it is designed to make publishing on the Internet as easy as possible.  Since it is an opensource software, there is no commercial license fee required to download and use it.  It has a growing active community of users, so there is also a vast amount of help resources and online support.

How do I setup my blog?  Isn’t it hard to do?

The WordPress install was engineered with the average user in mind, so setting up a blog on your own server is overwhelmingly easy.  The installation package comes with easy-to-read documentation and in most cases you can follow the Famous Five Minute Install.  If after reading this documentation you are still a little unsure of what you need to do, or if you are simply strapped for time and want a truly professional, custom look for your blog, give WEBii.net a call.

Is it hard to manage my blog?

No!  Once you have WordPress installed you will begin to see why it is so popular.  The interface for new posts is similar to that of a word processor, easy for everyone.  You can even setup multiple accounts to allow different people within your organization to post.  And remember, you don’t need to think of an amazing, lengthy article every day.  A blog can consist of news about your company, tips, promotions, and even Q & A.

I am ready to start my blog. What do I do now?

All that is left to do now is download WordPress and get started.

If you have even a few hundred dollars, you will get a much better ROI if you hire a true consultant in SEM and/or SEO. Get a comprehensive proposal with proven results from the consultant, and try to hire a company that really knows search. Personally I think it’s better to hire a company that specializes in search marketing specifically, instead of a company that does both that and web site development; but others would argue with me. Then hook the SE consultant up with your web site designer to have everyone playing for the same team.

If you want to do something helpful with your own in-house resources, write. Write a lot. Manage a regular blog, add industry related articles to your web site, submit “expert columns” to other publications, ask an assistant or intern to write articles and “tips of the day” for you. Participate in forums or help sites that relate to your expertise. Submit short tips and blurbs on networking web sites. Participate in newsgroups. Update your profile on other community web sites a lot, write some little blogs there (if you have a myspace page for your music business, perhaps).

If your employees have web sites, make sure they are selling you. Remember that anyone working for you has a potential reputation influence on your company. If your employee has a personal myspace or facebook page, check it for anything that might be unappealing to you or your customers and prospects, and possibly ask those employees to use the “private” setting to prevent open public viewing of all that information. If you have employees who participate in other web site communities, forums, and networking sites, try to encourage them to approach it in a professional manner with links back to your company web site and use those opportunities as sales pitches.

This quick and easy template did not provide this clinic with all it needed. Content is hard to read because it overlaps with other boxes. This site is lacking because it does not have the professional touch to make it stand out. Below, you can see that title tags created by the template program are limited to “Home”. This word does not tell the search engine, or a human being, anything about your company or line of business.

Wait, I am on your website. I can just find your contact information and call you myself.

Hold on…… I can’t find out how to contact you. Email? Phone? I’d even fax it to you. But I cannot find it on your website. You left it off. Or I just don’t know how to find it because you buried it way too far below the sand.

Contact information… where are you? I am looking for you…

Oh well, I am leaving now. I don’t want to look any longer. We could have been such great friends. Maybe… there will be a next time…

ahh, forget it, I am gone and I am not coming back.

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Are you at risk of losing potential customers because they can’t find your contact information? It may seem simple, but you’d be surprised at how many people leave it off or hide it so deep in their site that visitors just can’t find it. Your contact information should be where every visitor can find it, and fast.

Put it in plain sight. Potential customers are not going to dig around for it. They are just going to move on to the next site that offers them the same thing(s) you do.

It’s so easy and simple. REMEMBER: Make your contact information visible and easy to find.

Just make sure you don’t forget it so you won’t lose any business over it.